Washington, D.C., November 9, 2010 — After five years of litigation, a new challenge to the $200 billion backroom deal between major tobacco companies and 46 state attorneys general has been filed with the U.S. Supreme Court. CEI’s petition for Supreme Court review, filed yesterday, alleges that the tobacco “Master Settlement Agreement” violates the constitutional provision against multi-state agreements that have not been approved by Congress.

“The tobacco settlement was hatched in a smoke-free backroom between tobacco companies and state attorneys general,” said Sam Kazman, CEI General Counsel. “The state AGs imposed a massive national sales tax on cigarettes, without a single elected legislator at any level of government voting for it. This was a major power grab by state AGs at the expense of citizens.”

“No State shall, without the Consent of Congress …enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State, or with a foreign Power ….”

The Compact Clause was specifically aimed at preventing states from collectively encroaching on federal power or from ganging up on the citizens of other states. The tobacco settlement, a multi-state compact, plainly violates that provision. The settlement set a dangerous precedent in disregarding constitutional protections against government power. The deal also violates federal antitrust laws, setting up a national tobacco cartel that allows Big Tobacco to raise prices while severely restricting its competitors.

According to the terms of the deal, major tobacco companies would make annual payments to the states in perpetuity, with an estimated cost of over $200 billion over 25 years. Even small tobacco companies that were never part of the state lawsuits or subsequent settlements are required to make major escrow payments to the states.

“The MSA is an economic, political, and legal abomination backed by powerful vested interests and upheld by inadequate and destructive legal reasoning,” the cert petition alleges.

The plaintiffs in the case are a discount tobacco company, a tobacco shop, and an individual smoker. Erik Jaffe is lead counsel in the case, assisted by former federal appellate judge and Stanford constitutional law professor Michael McConnell, and CEI attorneys Hans Bader and Sam Kazman.